In what appears to be more of an honest accident than a work of cunning marketing strategy, two films about the inner lives and social stumbling blocks of precocious, “outsider” teenagers are set to hit theaters tomorrow. Jason Reitman’s Juno has been widely praised for its flashy script (which marries bloggish snark to the kind of mawkish morality melodrama that’s been in short supply since the demise of The O.C.), and for the work of lead actress Ellen Page (whose proficient puppeting of Diablo Cody’s detached slanguage Looks Like Acting).

Though hardly the revelation some of the rapturous reviews have made it out to be, Juno is the rare mainstream film that might allow a teenage girl to feel as though her desires have been recognized, and for that alone, it deserves praise. But anyone who tries to defend it against charges of overwritten, over-embellishment hasn’t seen Jennifer Venditti’s Billy the Kid, which begins its official theatrical run tomorrow with an exclusive engagement at the IFC Center in New York.

In the nine months since the film premiered at SXSW, Billy the Kid has completed a uniquely triumphant festival tour (including awards in Melbourne, Edinburgh, and Los Angeles), and overcome a would-be kiss-of-death Variety review (staunchly rebutted by Billy’s editor), to become one of the most critically acclaimed American non-fiction films of the year. Although a qualifying campaign was launched by the film’s producers, Billy failed to land a slot on the Academy’s documentary short list, and this seems to be indicative of a syndrome that AJ Schnack has been giving a lot of attention to: put simply, proficiently-made films about “issues” seem to have a better chance of attracting awards attention than artistically superior films without a distinct and supposedly noble cause. Ironically, when Billy first premiered, the film ended with an intertitle attributing its subject’s behavior to Asperger’s Syndrome, a type of mild autism that mainly impacts social skills; Venditti removed the card because she felt it went against her mission to present Billy as a person and not an example. As she told me in an interview for SXSW’s magazine, “That one card just raped the film of everything it was about.”

You certainly don’t need a distinct diagnosis to tell that Billy is different, but moreover, Venditti’s film is less about her subject’s problems than than the way he sees the world. The first section of Billy the Kid is essentially a monologue, in which Billy tells us who he thinks he is while we watch images that place his pop culture-addled conceptions in the context of his unglamorous, suburban reality. In the most successful scene using this tactic, dreamy, overexposed shots of Billy playing in snowy woods accompany his declaration that he someday plans to save a damsel in distress. Shortly thereafter, Billy finds his damsel behind the counter of the local diner, and the film switches into a kind of poetic verite examination of Billy’s first love. Her name is Heather, and like Billy, she’s been ostracized from local teen scene due to a disability beyond her control.

It would be easy to read Billy’s attraction to Heather as a natural pairing off of outsiders, but that would assume that Billy thinks of himself as an outsider, and I don’t think he does. He’s aware that he’s not like other kids, but as he puts it, he’s not going to let that go to his head. I’m not sure that Billy’s knowledge of John Hughes movies rivals mine, but if anything, I think he sees himself as something like the Andrew McCarthy to Heather’s Molly Ringwald, except significantly more butch. Whatever you do, don’t call him Ducky.

By this point in the film, it’s clear that Billy, like many teenagers, has cobbled together a worldview out of a number of pop cultural touchpoints and clichés. He’s copied Steven Seagal’s haircut; he culls The Terminator for his guiding philosophy. When asked by his mother how he feels about his stepfather, who is not in the film but is by all indications some kind of improvement over Billy’s crack-smoking biological dad, Billy offers a slogan: “All that matters to me is that you’re happy.” So it’s no surprise that Billy has neglected to think through what happens in a real-life relationship after its movie-perfect initiation. The second half of Billy the Kid is more than a document of Billy’s first romance—it’s his education that in real life, even the most distressed of damsels have free will.

It’s an incredibly intimate portrait, and one that feels more universal for its refusal to court a grander significance. In that way, form follows subject: Billy’s actions and pronouncements have no jurisdiction outside his extremely limited purview, because he can’t conceive of a world outside of himself, his school, his house, his first (and, he’s sure, only) love. The adults he’s exposed to are generally bemused but critical of his wordy bravado, while his mom gently tries to coax him into thinking long-term, big picture. In other words, “problems” not withstanding, Billy is just like any kid who has yet to figure out their place in the whole of the universe. Don’t we all have a tough time with that one?

Juno hits a few of its targets spot on, but ultimately, it doesn’t understand real-world teenage solipsism, and if it did, it wouldn’t have time for it. It flirts with being an empowerment fantasy for teenage girls, but at its core, it’s a Kids Do The Darndest Things fable in which the 16 year old know it all who somehow neglected to practice safe sex teaches a crew of dizzy grown ups a little something about love and life.

Which is not to say it’s all bad—there are a lot of things about teenage female desire that Juno gets very right. Certainly, for every teen courtship like Billy and Heather’s, in which both parties are plainly amateurs, there’s probably one like Juno and Bleeker’s, in which both girl and boy are terrified but at least one is pretending to be a pro.  At the very least, 16 year-old girls who fancy themselves smarter than married 30-somethings often find themselves pursued by the same. Unfortunately, Juno’s gag reflex kicks in a little too quickly on that one, and the turn towards respectability  it takes at that point in the narrative turns out to be its greatest disappointment. Diablo Cody seems to be pushing herself as a warrior for sex-positivity, so I do wonder if her original script contained such a clean sweep of moral ambiguity, before it got into the hands of the people who brought you Little Miss Sunshine.

Coming at similar themes from different corners, assaulting New York audiences on the same day, Juno and Billy the Kid uncommonly and uncannily illustrate the industry’s current, massive split between art and commerce. In this climate, a servicable teen sex com like Juno can show up in September and, with corporate marketing budget in hand leapfrog over a years worth of comers to become, in the day before its release, an all-but-certain sure thing at the Oscars and at the box office. Meanwhile, a film like Billy the Kid, which in one fell swoop all but changes the game of real teen representation, works the circuit for nine months collecting accolades, misses out on a much-needed Oscar boost and is now–like any true indie in this market–relying on first weekend gross to shape its distribution future. If you’re in New York and can only see one film over the next days, I promise you–Juno isn’t going anywhere. Billy needs you more.